innate. Secondly, it is very ftrange and unreafonable, to fuppofe innate practical principles, that terminate only in contemplation. Practical principles derived from nature are there for operation, and muft produce conformity of action, not barely fpeculative affent to their truth, or else they are in vain diftinguished from fpeculative maxims. Nature, I confefs, has put into man a defire of happiness, and an averfion to mifery: these indeed are innate practical principles, which (as practical principles ought) do continue conftantly to operate and influence all our actions without ceafing: thefe may be observed in all perfons and all ages, fteady and univerfal; but these are inclinations of the appetite to good, not impreffions of truth on the understanding. I deny not, that there are natural tendencies imprinted on the minds of men; and that, from the very first inftances of fenfe and perception, there are fome things that are grateful, and others unwelcome to them; fome things that they incline to, and others that they fly: but this makes nothing for innate characters on the mind, which are to be the principles of knowledge, regulating our practice. Such natural impreffions on the understanding are fo far from being confirmed hereby, that this is an argument against them; fince, if there were certain characters imprinted by nature on the understanding, as the principles of knowledge, we could not but perceive them conftantly operate in us and influence our knowledge, as we do those others on the will and appetite; which never cease to be the conftant fprings and motives of all our actions, to which we perpetually feel them strongly impelling us. §. 4. Another reason that makes me doubt of any innate practical principles, is, that I think there cannot any one moral rule be proposed, whereof a man may not justly demand a reafon: which would be perfectly ridiculous and abfurd, if they were innate, or fo much as felf-evident; which every innate principle muft needs be, and not need any proof to afcertain its truth, nor want any reason to gain it approbation. He would be thought void of common fenfe, who afked on the one D 2 Moral rules need a proof, ergo not in nate. fide, Book 1. fide, or on the other fide went to give, a reason, why it is impoffible for the fame thing to be, and not to be. It carries its own light and evidence with it, and needs no other proof: he that understands the terms, aflents to it for its own fake, or elfe nothing will ever be able to prevail with him to do it. But should that most unshaken rule of morality, and foundation of all focial virtue, "that one fhould do as he would be done unto," be propofed to one who never heard it before, but yet is of capacity to understand its meaning, might he not without any abfurdity ask a reason why? and were not he that propofed it bound to make out the truth and reasonablenefs of it to him? which plainly fhows it not to be innate; for if it were, it could neither want nor receive any proof; but must needs (at leaft, as foon as heard and understood) be received and affented to, as an unquestionable truth, which a man can by no means doubt of. So that the truth of all thefe moral rules plainly depends upon fome other antecedent to them, and from which they must be deduced; which could not be, if either they were innate, or fo much as felf-evident. Instance in §. 5. That men fhould keep their comkeeping com- pacts, is certainly a great and undeniable pacts. rule in morality. But yet, if a christian, who has the view of happinefs and mifery in another life, be asked why a man must keep his word, he will give this as a reafon; because God, who has the power of eternal life and death, requires it of us. But if an Hobbit be afked why, he will anfwer, because the' public requires it, and the Leviathan will punish you, if you do not. And if one of the old philofophers had been asked, he would have anfwered, because it was difhoneft, below the dignity of a man, and oppofite to virtue, the highest perfection of human nature, to do otherwise. Virtue gene. rally approved, not because innate, but because profitable. §. 6. Hence naturally flows the great variety of opinions concerning moral rules, which are to be found among men, according to the different forts of happiness they have a profpect of, or propofe to them felves t felves which could not be if practical principles were innate, and imprinted in our minds immediately by the hand of God. I grant the existence of God is fo many ways manifeft, and the obedience we owe him fo congruous to the light of reason, that a great part of mankind give testimony to the law of nature; but yet I think it must be allowed, that feveral moral rules may receive from mankind a very general approbation, without either knowing or admitting the true ground of morality; which can only be the will and law of a God, who fees men in the dark, has in his hand rewards and punishments, and power enough to call to account the proudest offender. For God having, by an infeparable connexion, joined virtue and public happinefs together, and made the practice thereof neceffary to the prefervation of fociety, and vifibly beneficial to all with whom the virtuous man has to do; it is no wonder, that every one fhould not only allow, but recommend and magnify thofe rules to others, from whofe obfervance of them he is fure to reap advantage to himself. He may, out of intereft, as well as conviction, cry up that for facred, which if once trampled on and prophaned, he himself cannot be fafe nor fecure. This, though it takes nothing from the moral and eternal obligation which these rules evidently have; yet it fhows that the outward acknowledgement men pay to them in their words, proves not that they are innate principles; nay, it proves not fo much, as that men affent to them inwardly in their own minds, as the inviolable rules of their own practice: fince we find that felf-intereft, and the conveniencies of this life, makemany men own an outward profeffion and approbation of them, whofe actions fufficiently prove, that they very little confider the law-giver that prefcribed these rules, nor the hell that he has ordained for the punishment of those that trangrefs them. §. 7. For, if we will not in civility allow too much fincerity to the profeffions of moft men, but think their actions to be the interpreters of their thoughts, we fhall find, that they have no fuch internal veneration D 3 Men's actions convince us, virtue is not their internal principle. that the rule of for for these rules, nor fo full a perfuation of their certainty and obligation. The great principle of morality, "to de as one would be done to," is more commended than practifed. But the breach of this rule cannot be a greater vice, than to teach others, that it is no moral rule, nor obligatory, would be thought madness, and contrary to that intereft men facrifice to, when they break it themselves. Perhaps confcience will be urged as checking us for fuch breaches, and fo the internal obligation and establishment of the rule be preferved. Confcience no proof of §. 8. To which I answer, that I doubt not but, without being written on their hearts, many men may, by the fame way that they come to the knowledge of other things, come to affent to feveral moral rules, and be convinced of their obligation. Others alfo may come to be of the fame mind, from their education, company, and cuftoms of their country; which perfuafion, however got, will ferve to fet conscience on work, which is nothing elfe, but our own opinion or judgment of the moral rectitude or pravity of our own actions. And if confcience be a proof of innate principles, contraries may be innate principles; fince fome men, with the fame bent of confcience, profecute what others avoid. Inftances of §. 9. But I cannot fee how any men fhould ever tranfgrefs those moral rules, with confidence and ferenity, were they innate, and ftamped upon their minds. View but an army at the facking of a town, and fee what observation, or fense of moral principles, or what touch of confcience for all the outrages they do. Robberies, murders, rapes, are the fports of men fet at liberty from punishment and cenfure. Have there not been whole nations, and thofe of the most civilized people, amongst whom the expofing their children, and leaving them in the fields to perish by want or wild beafts, has been the practice, as little condemned or fcrupled as the begetting them? Do they not ftill, in fome countries, put them into the fame graves with their mothers, if they die in child-birth: or difpatch them, if a pretended aftrologer 1 aftrologer declares them to have unhappy ftars? And are there not places where, at a certain age, they kill or expose their parents without any remorfe at all? In a part of Afia, the fick, when their cafe comes to be thought defperate, are carried out and laid on the earth, before they are dead; and left there, exposed to wind and weather, to perifh without affiftance or pity (a). It is familiar among the Mingrelians, a people profeffing chriftianity, to bury their children alive without fcruple (b). There are places where they cat their own children (c). The Caribbees were wont to geld their children, on purpose to fat and eat them (d). And Garcilaffo de la Vega tells us of a people in Peru, which were wont to fat and eat the children they got on their female captives, whom they kept as concubines for that purpose; and when they were paft breeding, the mothers themselves were killed too and eaten (e). The virtues, whereby the Tououpinambos believed they merited paradife, were revenge, and eating abundance of their enemies. They have not fo much as a name for God (f), and have no religion, no worship. The faints, who are canonized amongst the Turks, lead lives, which one cannot with modefty relate. A remarkable paffage to this purpose, out of the voyage of Baumgarten, which is a book not every day to be met with, I fhall fet down at large in the language it is published in. Ibi (fc. prope Belbes in Egypto) vidimus fanctum unum Saracenicum inter arenarum cumulos, ita ut ex utero matris prodiit, nudum fedentem. Mos eft, ut didicimus, Mahometiftis, ut eos, qui amentes & fine ratione funt, pro Sanctis colant & venerentur. Infuper & eos, qui cum diu vitam egerint inquinatiffimam, voluntariam demum pœnitentiam & paupertatem, fan&titate venerandos deputant. Ejufmodi verò genus bominum libertatem quandam effrænem habent, domos quas volunt intrandi, edendi, bibendi, & quod majus eft, concumbendi; ex quo concubitu fi proles fecuta fuerit, fancta fimiliter habetur. His ergo bomini part 4. p. 13. (b) Lambert apud (c) Voffius de Nili Origine, c. 18, 19. (e) Hift. des Incas, l. 1. c. 12. (a) Gruber apud Thevenot, Thevenot, p. 38. (4) P. Mart. Dec. 1. c. 16. 216, 231. D 4 (f) Lery, bus |